Children are taught from the earliest levels of public school education to respect those in positions of authority, like police officers. The mainstream media and even entertainment help reinforce the idea that citizens must always comply with the instructions or requests of law enforcement officers.
Police procedural shows, for example, might make non-compliance seem either impossible or like an invitation for officers to bend the rules. It’s important to remember that much of what you know about criminal justice likely comes from entertainment and is based more on what will seem dramatic rather than what is the most realistic.
Police officers can’t fabricate probable cause or force their way into your house just because you don’t let them inside, and they can’t arrest you just because you don’t do what they ask. Still, officers can and likely will pressure people to do or say certain things. Do you have to comply with any requests made you by a police officer?
The situation determines how compliant you must be
The reason for your encounter with police officers in the situation at the time of your encounter will influence your rights and their behavior.
If officers suspect you of a violent offense or have reason to think you are in possession of weapons, you may have to comply with their instructions to submit to a pat-down. In circumstances where they don’t have probable cause to suspect a weapon, you don’t necessarily have to let them talk to you or go through your pockets unless they place you under arrest.
Do you have to let the police into your home?
When the police show up at your front door, they will probably try to get you to invite them inside. Your sense of politeness and your social training to comply with the police might lead you to open your front door.
However, you are under no obligation to let them into your house unless they have a warrant. You also don’t have to answer their questions. You can offer to speak with them later with an attorney present but not at an unscheduled time in front of your house without representation.
In some situations, you don’t have to interact with officers at all
Police officers will do whatever they see as necessary to build a case and continue an investigation. When officers try to speak with you or ask you questions, you don’t necessarily have to stay there and continue the conversation.
You have the right to ask if they plan to detain you or arrest you. If they don’t, then you can ask if you are free to leave. Unless the officer has grounds to keep questioning you or to detain or arrest you, they will generally have to agree to let you go.
Knowing your rights ahead of time will make it easier for you to stand up for them in a moment when you have an unexpected interaction with law enforcement. Asserting your rights can make it easier for you to avoid criminal charges or to build a defense if you do wind up charged with a crime.
The bias in predictive policing
The goal of predictive policing is to do away with racial bias. A computer is used to predict where crimes will take place. The algorithm can tell officers where to go in advance if there’s a high probability of this activity, and they can hopefully respond quickly. This seems like a wise move since a computer, in theory, can’t be biased.
The influence of skewed data
The problem is that you have to “train” the system by submitting data about crimes that take place. An officer who makes a drug arrest on the same street corner every other week knows that this is a hotspot for drug sales, and putting that data into the system means the computer is going to suggest that police go to that location more often.
The issue is that you can have biased training data that skews the results. The computer isn’t biased, but the officer may be.
For instance, say there are two neighborhoods, one with mostly white citizens and the other with mostly African American citizens. The same amount of drug sales happen in both neighborhoods, but the officer is biased against the African American community. He or she goes to that neighborhood far more often, makes far more arrests, and then puts that data into the system.
The computer then predicts that more crime will take place in the African American neighborhood, which sends more officers there. They make more arrests, and the whole thing becomes a sort of feedback loop that enforces that biased initial data.
After an arrest
Bias and prejudice can lead to arrests, and this is just one way it happens. If you get arrested, you must understand your legal defense options.
When your blood alcohol concentration is 0.08% or higher, you can get arrested for driving while intoxicated (DWI). Although many times a DWI is a victimless crime that results from a traffic stop, the penalties are still very serious. After all, some DWI offenses result in crashes that cause property damage or even leave others hurt or killed.
As with most kinds of criminal offenses, repeat DWI offenders face harsher penalties than first-time DWI offenders. Increasing penalties with each subsequent conviction is a way to deter people from making the same mistake multiple times.
If you already have at least one DWI conviction on your record and you get pulled over and arrested again, what penalties will you likely face?
The monetary penalties more than double for follow-up DWI offenses
Texas doesn’t shy away from hitting those accused with a DWI right in the wallet. With the first offense, the fine for a DWI maxes out at $2,000. For a second offense, a judge could order a fine of as much as $4,000, while a third offense could mean a fine of $10,000.
There are other financial consequences too, including state fines of $3,000, $4,500 and $6,000 respectively. Court costs and other expenses can also increase how much a DWI charge will cost you. Those with repeat DWI offenses can also expect drastic changes in their insurance costs.
Incarceration terms increase with each offense
The same is true for incarceration. While a first offense only requires three to 30 days in jail and could mean a maximum of 180 days in jail, the penalties go up for repeat offenders. After a second DWI, you will have to serve at least one month in jail but possibly up to a year. Third DWI offenses mean between two and 10 years in prison.
The suspension of your license increases as well
The suspension of someone’s driver’s license is a standard penalty after a DWI charge. First-time offenders lose their license for up to a year, but subsequent offenders can lose their license for up to two years each time they plead guilty or get convicted.
The increased penalties for second and third DWI charges make defending against those subsequent charges or a first DWI a smart legal decision.
You’re pulled over for rolling too fast through a stop sign or making a turn a bit too wide. The next thing you know, the officer says that they’re concerned you may be intoxicated. They want you to take a Breathalyzer test.
Can you refuse? Yes, but there are a few things you need to consider before you take that step.
You face an automatic penalty for refusal
Like all other states, drivers in Texas are presumed to have consented to chemical testing as a condition of having a license in the first place. If you refuse to submit to a Breathalyzer test when asked, your license will automatically be suspended for 180 days.
The prosecutor may use your refusal against you
Without chemical proof that you were intoxicated, the prosecutor may have a harder time convicting you of driving while intoxicated (DWI), but there’s nothing stopping them from arguing that you refused to take the test because you knew you would blow higher than the legal limit. That kind of logic can be very persuasive in court.
You could end up being tested anyhow
There’s also no guarantee that the police won’t simply obtain a blood test, instead of the Breathalyzer. Just recently, for example, the police in Austin were conducting a “no-refusal initiative” aimed at getting drunk drivers off the street during the holiday season. If someone refused the Breathalyzer exam, the police simply obtained a search warrant for their blood.
While that may not always happen — it could, especially if a police officer is very determined and a judge is willing.
There are plenty of ways to challenge the accuracy of a Breathalyzer exam and other defenses that may apply to your case. If you’re charged with drunk driving, let an experienced defender protect your future.
What you need to know about Texas’ drug courts
A recent news story chronicled how Nueces County’s Drug Court works. This coastal Texas county isn’t unique in its operation of a drug court program, though. At least 13 local jurisdictions run these courts in conjunction with Texas Child Protective Services (CPS). The Dallas City Attorney’s Office runs the South Dallas Community Court.
What is the role of a drug court?
Many factors motivate counties or cities to set up community drug courts. Most do so to try and address the roots of a person’s substance abuse. This deferred prosecution program often allows families to remain intact, drug offenders to stay employed and active in the community while getting the help for their addiction that they so desperately need.
Proponents of such alternative sentencing programs believe that keeping individuals with drug dependencies out of prison is key to helping defendants kick their habit and reduce recidivism. They also believe that helping addicts overcome their problems is one key toward building more stable family units.
Data compiled by CPS shows that there were at least 11,000 kids removed from their homes in Texas in 2018 because their parents had a substance abuse problem. Many of the cases that make it to drug court involve parents who are no longer capable of caring for their kids because of their substance abuse habit. CPS sees this court system as a last-ditch option for keeping families together before they intervene and remove the children from their parents’ home.
Many drug court defendants have been in a courtroom before
A significant number of the parents who find themselves in drug court aren’t inside of a courtroom for the first time in their lives. Many of the defendants struggled with drug or other issues when they were juveniles and didn’t receive the help they needed. The court sees getting them the right kind of help as the final option for helping them turn their lives around.
While the prospect of staying free to get the help that you need for drug addiction may sound ideal, it’s not an option available to just anyone in Texas. Whether you qualify for participation depends on various factors, including funding, the seriousness of your offense and your potential for success at overcoming your addiction. An attorney can review your Dallas case and help you understand more.
People drink more now than before Prohibition
Prohibition, a massively failed exercise to curb drinking in the United States by making it illegal, started in part because people simply thought there was too much alcohol consumption in the United States. There was no real way to dictate how much people could drink, so the solution was to make it entirely illegal. This failed in numerous ways, not the least of which was that the illegal alcohol trade flourished, and it was soon repealed.
Back then, it is estimated that the average person consumed about 2 gallons of alcohol every year. Since there was a large enough portion of the population that didn’t drink to vote Prohibition in, that naturally means that those who did drink consumed more than 2 gallons each. That’s still true today, and any average is bound to be lower than consumption for those who do partake.
How drinking has increased in America
That said, some studies now claim that Americans are up to an average of 2.3 gallons of alcohol every year. That’s more than it was when Prohibition began, though less than the high point of 7 gallons in the early 1800s.
It’s important to note that this is counting alcohol itself, not liquid. For example, a standard beer is around 5% alcohol and 95% water, malt, etc. To drink 2 gallons of alcohol, a person would have to drink 40 gallons of beer.
The impact of all that drinking
In the modern era, one impact this increased drinking has had is an increase in DWI charges. A drunk driving conviction can have a significant impact on your future. If you’re facing charges, make sure you have some experienced guidance throughout the criminal process.
You lost your temper, that’s true. Maybe you uttered a few threats that you didn’t really mean and threw a punch or shoved someone to the ground in anger.
Now, the police are calling your number or have come to your door and you’re not sure what to do. You’re pretty certain you’re about to be charged with some kind of assault.
Five mistakes you shouldn’t make right now
Under the circumstances, your stress is pretty natural. It’s important, however, not to let your feelings take over and lead you deeper into trouble. Here are five things you should not do:
- Talk to the police: Police officers can lie to you. They are trained to use everything from sympathy ploys to intimidation to get suspects to start talking. Whether you’re in handcuffs or not, you need to exercise your right to remain silent. You cannot talk yourself out of this situation.
- Blast everything on social media: Step away from your keyboard and stay quiet. If you start railing against the other party to this situation or the police, that can add fuel to the fire you’re in (and become evidence against you in court).
- Contact the other party: Whether you hope to broker peace or want to tell them exactly what you think of them, contacting the other party to your fight right now is a very bad idea. You could just end up with more charges.
- Destroy evidence: Maybe the fight started out over text or via Messenger. Maybe you had your phone on “record” during the fight. Either way, don’t give into the temptation to destroy those records. Destroying evidence is a crime even more serious than what you’re already facing.
- Try to handle things alone: You need experienced guidance from a criminal defense attorney right now.
When your future’s on the line, get the kind of legal help you can rely on. You don’t want your situation to worsen.
When an officer gives you a field sobriety test, you may think that there are highly specific standards that must be met in order for you to be arrested. However, the reality is that these tests are subjective. The officer’s perception of you and how you’re acting, how you were driving and even how you look could influence if you’re arrested or not.
Field sobriety tests are subjective, and the officer’s opinion can be affected by how you were driving before the traffic stop. For example, following others too closely, straddling the centerline or responding to traffic signals slowly were all visual clues that officers used to identify drivers who may be impaired behind the wheel, according to a study from the Touro College & University System.
Can you be arrested even when you pass field sobriety tests?
Even if you do well on the field sobriety tests, there is still a chance that the officer could say that you didn’t do well enough or that you failed one badly enough to be arrested and taken into custody. They could claim that they have other evidence, or they may use a combination of visual cues as well as flimsy evidence from your field sobriety tests to claim you’re impaired when you’re not.
The reality is that these tests can work when they’re correctly and by someone who is trained appropriately. However, many people judging those tests come up with different conclusions for the same defendant, even when that training was taken.
Your attorney will fight on your side to defend you against allegations of driving drunk. Field sobriety tests aren’t foolproof, and you deserve to be heard if the tests falsely determined that you were impaired.
There are generally three situations in which police officers can search you, your vehicle or your property. The first is when you give them permission to do so. Once you grant permission, especially if they find signs of illegal activity, it will be nearly impossible for you to revoke that permission.
The second situation stems from officers getting a warrant to conduct the search. Warrants can compel you to let officers into your house or even to provide genetic information for testing. The third situation that leads to searches is when officers have probable cause to conduct that search. How do police officers establish probable cause to conduct a search?
Probable cause stems from the reasonable person standard
The term probable cause essentially means that the officers involved had every reason to suspect criminal activity.
Generally speaking, in order for an officer to claim that they had probable cause to conduct a search without a warrant or permission, they should either have witnessed a crime taking place themselves or have very strong evidence of criminal activity. The evidence that they claim justifies the search would have to convince a reasonable person that the individual in question had likely engaged in criminal activity.
The smell of marijuana smoke coming from a vehicle could be probable cause to search the occupants for drugs or possibly to request physical samples to test for chemical impairments in the driver. Visible weapons or drug paraphernalia, aggressive or implicating statements and even someone’s body language can occasionally establish probable cause for a search.
People do challenge searches conducted due to probable cause
Some individuals accused of a criminal offense will challenge whether the officer involved had the right to conduct a search. Trying to undermine the idea that the officer had probable cause for the search is a potential defense strategy in some circumstances. If you believe that officers violated the probable cause standard when they searched you prior to your arrest, you may want to discuss that concern with your defense attorney.
For most convicted of a DWI in Dallas, Texas, the inability to drive is quite problematic. Without reliable transportation, many people cannot continue working, making it hard to support their families. In some cases, those convicted of driving while intoxicated may qualify for an occupational driver’s license. This license may minimize financial hardships for you and your family members.
Before going forward with this post, you need to know that it is not possible to acquire an occupational license that will allow you to operate commercial vehicles. After all, the sole purpose of an occupational license is so that you can travel to and from work or school. It may not be used to drive for other purposes, even when your job involves driving.
Although it is not difficult to petition for an occupational license, many find that having a qualified legal representative facilitates the process. An attorney can help you determine if you are eligible for the license. If you are eligible, your lawyer can help you gather and submit the necessary paperwork.
You should also know that if you lost your driving privileges due to a DWI, you may have to wait for an occupational license. For example, after alcohol or drug-involved offenses, you must typically wait 90 days before receiving your occupational license.
In another example, if you have been convicted of an offense involving alcohol, you must usually wait 180 days to get your license. In some cases, a judge may choose to waive the waiting periods associated with DWI offenses and convictions. However, it is wise to seek assistance to ensure your petition results in the most favorable outcome.
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